What stopped us?

[steelcityowlsfan]

What stopped us being a truly big club in our history?

 

I ask this because Sheffield is the 4th or 5th largest city in England and though we have won the league 4 times it's been a long tome since we were a force in English football but why is this?

 

Wednesday have had periods in time when they have been a top 6 club in England and challenged for honours. In the late 20's early 30's we were a great side and then again in the early 60's. The 80's saw us a decent side again and then in the 90's a great side once more before our fall from grace in 2000.

 

But what stopped us pushing on in the 60's, 80's and most recently the 90's? Was the Cantona saga the difference for us that season? With him in the side some argue we may have won the league?

 

What do you attribute to us not pushing on as a club?  The wrong chairman?, signings or lack of? focus on stadium rather than players that was once an accusation thrown at us. Sheffield not being fashionable enough, poor infrastructure?

 

I'd be interested to hear from our fans especially our older ones as to why they feel we never pushed on like Manchester or Liverpool to become a top team in the land.

 

Not far off 20 years outside the top flight for a club that took 45k to Wembley. We might not be as big as we think, but maybe we could have been.

 

[matthefish2002]

Think a lot of clubs you can say were among the best teams in the country for a period of time but never sustained it over a longer period.

Villa, Leeds, Newcastle, Derby, Forest have all had periods of success but then fell back to be just another big club.

 

Think some clubs have advantage in modern football of being based in London.

Liverpool and Man United really stand out as iconic British clubs think they had they success at the right times in the media age to capitalise on support outside they area.

[Mr Meadows]

If we’d backed Wilkinson we might have won the league (he went off and won it with Leeds) and had we managed to keep hold of big Ron am sure we’d have had a few more trophies on our honours list

 

Would we have won the league if we’d signed Cantona? Possibly

 

would we have dropped out of the premier league if we’d fully embraced di canio and carbone? Probably not

Edited April 20, 2018 by Mr Meadows

[lʍO‾ǝsnoɥpooM]

crap city, not as desirable to live in like places such as london or manchester, harder to recruit players in the long run, end up getting 2nd tier choices or journeymen 

[torres]

As a city we always under achieve and it drives me insane.

 

It's either due to down right ineptitude or it's a total lack of ambition.

 

We are the home of football - do we promote that? Do we heck!!

Think if Manchester/Liverpool/Leeds had this honour  - we would be sick of it - yet hardly anyone knows about us is England

 

As a place i think we are happy to be ''ok''  - we are like a massive village rather than a city.

 

We get 50k between us at the minute as football clubs as we are both garbage - imagine if we were both good?

 

We need a huge shake up and have done for ages - the potential in Sheffield is huge - but will we ever reach our potential ...?????

 

 

 

 

[steelcityowlsfan]

5 minutes ago, torres said:

As a city we always under achieve and it drives me insane.

 

It's either due to down right ineptitude or it's a total lack of ambition.

 

We are the home of football - do we promote that? Do we heck!!

Think if Manchester/Liverpool/Leeds had this honour  - we would be sick of it - yet hardly anyone knows about us is England

 

As a place i think we are happy to be ''ok''  - we are like a massive village rather than a city.

 

We get 50k between us at the minute as football clubs as we are both garbage - imagine if we were both good?

 

We need a huge shake up and have done for ages - the potential in Sheffield is huge - but will we ever reach our potential ...?????

 

 

 

 

We even mucked up the airport and then there was the DV stadium debacle.

[torres]

Just now, steelcityowlsfan said:

We even mucked up the airport and then there was the DV stadium debacle.

 

It's a joke pal.

 

 

[room0035]

We have never had the full package, we have had good teams in the past, but not the financial support, or a chairman with money but a rubbish team.

 

The last time I though we would kick on and establish ourselves was 94/95 - I seem to remember an investment from Charterhouse of about £15m at the time when the team was doing well in the league and pushing for Europe, we had been chosen as one of the host stadiums for Euro 96, but instead of investing in the club and playing staff Dave Richards used us as a steppingstone to getting the Premier League job.

 

We have also been hinder by the location of the stadium so closed to an housing estate and the local infrastructure being so poor. If you can remember we tried to sell the training ground to get out of debt and move the club forward and the council blocked the transaction. Considering the amount of Owls that on and were on the council over the years we have got no support what so ever.

 

You then look across at Manchester and everytime either United or City need anything it is allowed and passed Man City even got a free stadium after the Commonwealth games in Manchester.

 

We missed the boat in 2016 and realistically now need to rebuild and pray that breaking FFP does not put us back 5yrs+ - This summer is going to be very interesting but no more mistake on or off the pitch because if the level of errors continue we will disappear back into a slumbering giant and the last few years will be once again another false dawn.

[room0035]

6 minutes ago, steelcityowlsfan said:

We even mucked up the airport and then there was the DV stadium debacle.

The Olympic legacy park with no sport facilities we produced one of the poster girls of the 2012 Olympics then 18 months later knock down the stadium where she trained and replace it with another School.

 

We are not the city of Sport we are the City Council that hates sport. 

[steveger]

Sheffield is no longer the 4th or 5th largest city in England any longer, it's a myth, most cities have modernised, evolved and moved forward and expanded, Sheffield is held back by a socialist council with a runner up mentality, Sheffielder's are sadly used to seeing all the good things happen at other regions and cities whilst they moan on about trees

Edited April 20, 2018 by steveger

[Bassetts Allsorts]

Didn't someone like Carlton Palmer blame the rivalry for both Sheffield clubs' lack of success?

[torres]

18 minutes ago, steveger said:

Sheffield is no longer the 4th or 5th largest city in England any longer, it's a myth, most cities have modernised, evolved and moved forward and expanded, Sheffield is held back by a socialist council with a runner up mentality, Sheffielder's are sadly used to seeing all the good things happen at other regions and cities whilst they moan on about trees

 

I agree  - as people on a whole - we have got the city and clubs we deserve.

 

If people get out of this down and out mentality,  and become proud to be educated,  proud to be ambitious, want to be the best, expect the to be best - then our potential as an area is huge

 

[torres]

6 minutes ago, Bassett's Allsorts said:

Didn't someone like Carlton Palmer blame the rivalry for both Sheffield clubs' lack of success?

 

It's totally destroyed Manchester and Liverpool - Good one Carlton!!!

[Ever the pessimist]

The clubs are sadly typical of a parochial, self deprecating attitude which, although quite endearing at times, is ultimately self defeating.

 

It's about to happen again the mayoral elections - the winner will be someone who openly doesn't want a 'Sheffield City Region' at all - but a Leeds centric deal instead.

[Buckwheat]

This is always a hard one for someone like me who was brought up being told of past 40/50000 attendances by parents and their friends. Then when things become open on web sites , apart from a 6 year period in the late1940's early 1950's, finding in the other 144 years we've only averaged 30000 on 6 occasions. It's all too easy to look back on all the attendances for clubs and find neither ourselves or the Blunts are in the big league. We've had great teams in the past 50 years but have rarely been able to average 2/3rds of our stadium capacity. Too many fans of both city sides don't want to live in the real world and admit our standing. Always, well most of the time, been proud of the Owls, some top 2 and 3 league positions, FA Cup Finalists, League Cup Winners, European games against likes of Barcelona. One of the most iconic upto date grounds. At least if any Blunt starts bigging it up I just ask them how many European games have you played and have you won a semi final in the last 80 years, both answers no. And how many times in the last 2 centuries have you been in the Leagues top 2 positions, not once. Not sure I'll ever understand why many smaller cities have had much larger attendances than Sheffield. Maybe that's just how it is, but personally I couldn't give a throw.

[Avon barksdale]

Is it Cos we sacked megson??? 

[torres]

3 minutes ago, Ever the pessimist said:

The clubs are sadly typical of a parochial, self deprecating attitude which, although quite endearing at times, is ultimately self defeating.

 

It's about to happen again the mayoral elections - the winner will be someone who openly doesn't want a 'Sheffield City Region' at all - but a Leeds centric deal instead.

 

100% agree

 

Our local paper/radio sum it up

[York_Owl]

1 hour ago, Mr Meadows said:

If we’d backed Wilkinson we might have won the league (he went off and won it with Leeds) and had we managed to keep hold of big Ron am sure we’d have had a few more trophies on our honours list

 

Would we have won the league if we’d signed Cantona? Possibly

 

would we have dropped out of the premier league if we’d fully embraced di canio and carbone? Probably not

This in a nutshell. 

 

We have rarely had a combination of having a good manager with financial backing in place at the same time.  When we did, under Big Ron, we won a trophy.

 

Had we given Wilkinson the financial backing he got at L**ds I see no reason why we couldn't have won something (possibly the league title).

 

Unfortunately, when we did have the backing we never really had the right manager in place.  Francis just couldn't get us over the line (a common theme throughout his managerial career).  Then as we moved through the 90s in the Premier league we never had the right manager in place (apart from briefly with the return of Big Ron) and were not really able to compete financially as the other clubs took spending levels to another level.

[Watto]

8 minutes ago, Buckwheat said:

This is always a hard one for someone like me who was brought up being told of past 40/50000 attendances by parents and their friends. Then when things become open on web sites , apart from a 6 year period in the late1940's early 1950's, finding in the other 144 years we've only averaged 30000 on 6 occasions. It's all too easy to look back on all the attendances for clubs and find neither ourselves or the Blunts are in the big league. We've had great teams in the past 50 years but have rarely been able to average 2/3rds of our stadium capacity. Too many fans of both city sides don't want to live in the real world and admit our standing. Always, well most of the time, been proud of the Owls, some top 2 and 3 league positions, FA Cup Finalists, League Cup Winners, European games against likes of Barcelona. One of the most iconic upto date grounds. At least if any Blunt starts bigging it up I just ask them how many European games have you played and have you won a semi final in the last 80 years, both answers no. And how many times in the last 2 centuries have you been in the Leagues top 2 positions, not once. Not sure I'll ever understand why many smaller cities have had much larger attendances than Sheffield. Maybe that's just how it is, but personally I couldn't give a throw.

Leeds because it's one team city ?

Can't think of any smaller cities that get larger crowds year in year out that haven't moved to a new purpose built ground , maybe Norwich or Newcastle but both sides have had mainly premier league football over the last 20 years.

Arguably if Wedneday were to get to the premier now we'd average at least 30-35 k but sadly we've gone from a big club up to the 90s to the rest ie Derby, forest etc 

 

[hasthagotanycheese]

Whether we like it or not, Sheffield is very much a second class city. We are held back by our inability to elect anybody else but Labour MP's. If the city was politically more competitive then the other parties would try harder to woo us with big projects and spending promise's but because the Left Wing party is such a shoe in round here then they dont bother as it would be wasted effort. In turn Labour dont need to bother with us as they are more or less guaranteed parlimentary seats round here. Until the political landscape changes then we will be a bit of a back water.

 

That said. Its also very much about money. Its no co-incidence that Liverpool's domination of the English game co-incided with the demise of the pools in favour of the National Lottery. They have not won the top flight since the Lotto's inception and have been replaced by clubs whose owners can fling big bucks at the clubs like Chelsea & Man City for example.

 

I would like to see the FA grow a pair of rounduns and make all English Football truly competitive with limits on  spending by division, squad sizes, ticket prices, limit shareholdings etc etc. Until that point then we will have to hope to get lucky in order to have our time in the sun again.